A weird, wonderful tease

I never thought I’d see, let alone enjoy, watching a strip show starring Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

However, as the two masked dancers gyrated while disrobing under moody scarlet lighting, I laughed and whooped along with 30 other strangers in a Chico bar.

On the first Saturday of (most) every month, you never know what you’re going to get when the Maltese Bar & Tap Room’s house burlesque troupe, The Malteazers, hits the stage. And that’s part of its appeal. Before the “Unsexy Burlesque”-themed show on Feb. 3 was over, I had seen a trailer park fight that ended with torn-off tops and Juicy sweats; a grandma getting down with her walker; and a stalker whisking off a black trench coat to The Lonely Island’s “The Creep,” revealing a brassiere with large bespectacled eyes, complete with a nose and mustache over the performer’s stomach and a tongue peeking out of her panties.

The Malteazers shows are always something spectacular, sexy and, more often than not, a little wacky. The group has covered a variety of themes over the last five years, from nerds to beach babes, and from masquerade to gods and monsters. Coming up in March: Naughty ’90s.

Over coffee on a recent Friday morning, four of the members who have worked center stage and behind the scenes for the troupe for years spoke candidly and enthusiastically. Using their stage names, they chatted about what it’s like to be part of the family of performers that is now 14 strong. What was emphasized throughout the conversation was how much everyone involved values freedom of expression, confidence, creativity and acceptance.

“I feel like every show we try to remind our audience: We’re open to accept you, no matter who you are, where you are, where you’re coming from,” said Willow Wallflower (the troupe’s “resident crooner”). “But also, this is for us; this performance is for us to show how comfortable and confident that we feel. It’s our freedom, it’s our way of expressing those emotions.”

Lola James, the Maltese’s sound technician and periodic burlesque performer, jumped in: “And everybody’s so cute! You see everybody on the stage, just all the cute people, [and you say], ‘Man, I want to be a part of that cute people group.’”

At the latest show, Wallflower sang her rendition of “Oh! Darling,” by The Beatles, clad in a black-and-red-flowered dress and red Chico State stole, while Miss Dee (who’d already wowed the crowd with “The Creep”) joined her on stage, stripping from a white graduation gown into a tank top fashioned with words like “college debt” and “credit card debt.”

Miss Dee (you’ll understand the “double-E” when you see her, she said slyly), has been performing since The Malteazers’ debut in 2013, and made one point crystal clear: They are not strippers.

“It’s theater; it’s the art of the tease,” she said. “You may get to see skin, but you’re not ever going to see everything. It’s more of what we don’t show you.”

Starlett Eve, a soft-spoken thespian with a flair for 1950s style, love of Shakespeare and specialty in comedic acts, chimed in that for her, it’s all about “creating a story.”

“The tease helps create that vision along the way,” she said. It’s also a passion project: “A lot of us get to pour our hearts out into these numbers that we do. A little bit of us is in each.”

Many of the performers have found themselves changed by the experience, too. “Here, I stepped out of my comfort zone,” Miss Dee said. “[There are] things that I’m uncomfortable with [about] my body, and was like, ‘Y’know what? Nobody else cares. Why should I care?’ Nobody else cares if I have a little bit of a tummy. They just think I’m beautiful and fun and [they] enjoy the show.”

Troupe Manager Annie Eblin, a former Malteazers performer, serves as the organizer and problem-solver. Eblin’s partner, Maltese owner Archer Lombardi, co-founded the queer-friendly burlesque group with former Bar Manager Nicola Beatts in 2013, modeled after those he had seen in Washington, D.C. Eblin and Lombardi operate the bar together, and their goal has been to create a safe space for creative minds and performers of all gender identities, body sizes and shapes.

“Archer and I identify somewhere on the LGBTQ spectrum, and feel that it is important for Chico’s queer community to offer a safe space to express themselves, hang out, socialize, etc.,” Eblin wrote via Facebook Messenger while traveling in Thailand. “We believe that the best use of this establishment is for community service, fundraisers, quirky and different events and fun. In short, we strive to ‘keep Chico weird.’”

Eblin said everyone has input on everything and works together to make shows happen. Performers create their own characters and routines based on the month’s theme, which, like new members, is chosen by the entire group.

“You would think, ‘That sounds like chaos,’ right? But this group is so unique,” Eblin said. “They work together. They hear each other and promote one another’s creativity. I swear, I’ve never seen anything like it. … It just keeps getting better and better, and I feel sometimes like I am just along for the ride, seeing where our collective creativity takes us.”